Cultural influences
Hallaig is incorporated in the lyrics of The Jacobite Rising, an opera by Peter Maxwell Davies, and can be heard read by MacLean, as part of the song "Hallaig" on Martyn Bennett's album Bothy Culture .
MacLean talked extensively about the poem in Timothy Neat's documentary for RTÉ, Hallaig: the Poetry and Landscape of Sorley MacLean in 1984, for example he analyzed how much traditional Gaelic song influenced him. [4]
The poem inspired an organ work by William Sweeney called " Hallaig 12' " commissioned for the inaugural concert of the Flentrop Organ in Dunblane Cathedral.
The name MV Hallaig was chosen for Caledonian MacBrayne 's first hybrid-powered vehicle ferry, [5] launched in December 2012, now serving the Sconser to Raasay route.
Analysis
Analyzing the English version (translated by MacLean himself) it is possible to notice that he used the first person narration and this technique enables the audience to share the emotions of the author. [6]
- "The window is nailed and boarded / Through which I saw the West / And my love is at the Burn of Hallaig, / A birch tree,"
The timeframe is uncertain as MacLean uses different tenses to mix past and present. According to the analysis of the BBC, [3] "the birch tree depicts something alive but also rooted in the nature and history of the place."
Also, they add that "MacLean's love is both compared to a tree and personified as a woman or girl. It could refer to his love of the place and the people (...) or it could be a specific woman he admires and feels love for."
- "She is a birch, a hazel, / A straight, slender young rowan."
MacLean establishes also a relation between people and nature, suggesting that they are one and the same and the pine trees plantations are related with artificial landscapes:
- "They are not the wood I love"
In the following line the narrator shows his suffering when he realizes that his people are dead and the village they left behind is empty, that makes the audience share his pain. However, it is still very hard for him to accept it because of his denialism of what happened.
- "They are still in Hallaig... The dead have been seen alive."
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Scottish Gaelic literature refers to literary works composed in the Scottish Gaelic language, which is, like Irish and Manx, a member of the Goidelic branch of Celtic languages. Gaelic literature was also composed in Gàidhealtachd communities throughout the global Scottish diaspora where the language has been and is still spoken.
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